No batsman prizes his wicket more highly, and no wicket in all of cricket is more highly prized. Jacques Kallis is the broad-shouldered colossus of the South African team, a figure whose looming presence inspires calm in some and dread in others.
Few players who belong to the modern age are a better fit for the notion of the classical cricketer. Kallis is a fine, forceful batsman who has at his disposal both a rock-solid technique and a mind impervious to distraction. Though his role as a bowler diminishes with each passing season, he will be remembered as a purveyor of sometimes surprising pace and swing, and awkward bounce. In the slips, his sure-handedness and rattlesnake reflexes make ridiculous catches look regulation.

Kallis announced himself as a batsman of international stature in his seventh Test, the drawn Boxing Day epic at Melbourne in 1997, when he scored a fighting 101 on a worn last-day pitch. Not even Glenn McGrath and Shane Warne could dislodge him before he had all but saved the match for South Africa.

Over the years Kallis has delivered many such innings, performances in which grit is a far more valuable commodity than glitz to a South African team that remains more confident in the field and with its fast bowlers in full cry than as a batting unit. Kallis has willingly shouldered the role of the fulcrum around which the wheel must try to turn. But, occasionally, he has unfurled a stroke of startling aggression that hints at what might have been.

Certainly, his lofted drive, which begins with a menacing backlift before uncoiling into the irresistible momentum of a mighty downward swoop of the bat and finishing in a twirl of Baroque, might be described as Mozart in motion. In the lightning flash of that fleeting instant it really does seem as if Kallis could, in the words of one observer, hit a six whenever he felt like it.

His critics, particularly those who have a limited understanding of the dynamics of the South African team, accuse him of not dominating attacks he has already ground into the dust, of unnecessarily slow scoring, and of failing to take the match situation into account as he plots his innings. All of which hints at selfishness, which is quite ironical, because his team-mates vouch for the fact that Kallis bats the way he does precisely because he puts his team first and his personal ambitions some way behind. It's the only way he knows how.Telford Vice

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Timeline

December 1995-January 1996 A slow start

An ordinary debut in a rain-hit Test in Durban. Kallis lasted just 12 balls for one run in his only innings. His performance in his next few games was hardly a sign of things to come, averaging 8.14 in his first five Tests. However, his 3 for 29 in the nerve-wracking moments of the Port Elizabeth Test against Australia gave him the much-needed recognition as a bowler.

December 26-30, 1997 First Test century

Scores his first Test century, against Australia in Melbourne. A gutsy second-innings 101 under pressure saves South Africa from defeat as Kallis bats out the last day.

January 16, 1998 First ODI ton

Scores his maiden ODI century, 111 against New Zealand at the WACA. South Africa win convincingly.

Averages 42 with the bat in South Africa's first tour of England since re-admittance. His four-wicket haul at Lord's helps bundle out England and ensures an easy ten-wicket win. He goes past his highest Test score at Old Trafford, scoring 132 as his side pile on a mammoth 552.

October-November 1998 The big-match player

Shows his all-round skills in ODIs during the Wills International Cup (which later became the ICC Champions Trophy) in Dhaka. Scores an attacking 113 off 100 balls in the semi-final and sinks West Indies in the final with 5 for 30, his first five-for.

January 1999 Butchering the Windies

Becomes only the second South African to score a century, fifty and take five wickets in a Test after Aubrey Faulkner. Following his 110 in the first innings against West Indies in Cape Town,

Adaptability is the feature of Kallis' batting in his maiden tour of India, where he shows his skills against the turning ball. Falls five short of a well deserved ton in Bangalore and picks up the Man-of-the-Series award in South Africa's successful series in India.

July-August 2000 Blunting the spinners

Perhaps Kallis's most valuable innings under pressure, with the spinners on a rampage. Trailing 0-1 in the series, Kallis's dogged 87 in the second innings in Kandy on a turning track makes the difference, as South Africa overcame a first-innings deficit to win by 7 runs.

Highest Test score, against Zimbabwe in Bulawayo. Kallis scores an undefeated 189 and is the victim of yet another declaration, denying him a double-hundred. Kallis isn't dismissed throughout the two-Test series and ends with an average of 388, occupying the crease for 1028 minutes in all.

November 2001 3000 runs and 100 wickets

Kallis' wicket of Sachin Tendulkar in the second innings of the Bloemfontein Test is his 100th in Tests and in doing so, he becomes the eighth to complete the double of 3000 runs and 100 wickets.

August 2003 The six-for that sinks England

At Headingley, Kallis achieves his best bowling figures in Tests with 6 for 54 to destroy England in their second innings and complete a 191-run win. South Africa take an unassailable 2-1 lead in the series.

The dream run, from Johannesburg to Hamilton - 158, 177, 130*, 130*, 150* - three-figure scores in five consecutive Tests, a record which places him below only the great Don Bradman. In four Tests against West Indies, Kallis piles on 712 runs at an average of 178. In the second Test in Durban, Kallis goes past the 5000-run mark and becomes the fourth player in history to achieve the double of 5000 runs and 150 wickets in Tests, putting him in the top bracket of all-time best allrounders.

March 2005 The fastest ever Test fifty from Kallis? You heard that right

Not the sort of record one would associate with his style of batting. But in an astonishing day's play with the batsmen making merry against a depleted Zimbabwe attack at Newlands, he breaks the record for the fastest fifty in Tests, off 24 balls, which included five sixes and three fours.

April 2005 South Africa's highest Test run-getter

During his 147 against West Indies in Antigua, Kallis goes past Gary Kirsten's record for most runs scored by a South African in Tests. Kirsten retired with 7289 runs.

At the ICC Awards in Melbourne, the decision is unanimous. Kallis' superb run in Tests gets him two awards - he is named the Test Player of the Year and the Joint Player of the Year, which he shares with Andrew Flintoff. He ends 2005 with 1288 runs, his best returns in a calendar year.

March 2006 The stand-in skipper

Filling in for the injured Graeme Smith, Kallis captains his side in a Test for the first time. He is just a couple of wickets away from a dream start, as Australia hold their nerve in a thriller at the Wanderers.

April 2006 The centurion in Centurion

Yet another milestone for Kallis as he plays his 100th Test, against New Zealand in Centurion. Incidentally, Stephen Fleming and Shaun Pollock celebrate the same milestone in the same game.

In the second Test of that series, in Johannesburg, Kallis surpasses Sir Garry Sobers' record of 8032 Test runs and becomes only the second player, after Sobers, to achieve the double of 8000 runs and 200 wickets.

March-April 2007 Good World Cup, but…

Kallis finishes as South Africa's leading run-scorer in the World Cup with 485 runs. But his slow scoring costs him a place in the World Twenty20 the same year.

October 2007 Tormenting Pakistan

After dominating Pakistan in the home series in 2006-07, he does the same in their own backyard, scoring three centuries in the two-Test series. South Africa win the series 1-0 and Kallis walks away with the Man-of-the Series prize.

In his 149th Test match, Kallis bags his first pair, against Sri Lanka in Durban. South Africa lose by 208 runs.

January 4, 2012 Unforgettable 150th Test

Kallis becomes the first batsman to score 150-plus in his 150th Test. He goes on to score 224, his second double-century and his highest score in Test cricket.

July 21-22, 2012 A new high in England

England's been one of the least productive countries for Kallis in Tests, but at The Oval he gets it right and scores an unbeaten 182 - his second Test hundred in England, and his first there in 14 years - as South Africa amass 637 for 2 declared, and thrash the hosts by an innings and 12 runs.

A few months after conquering England, Kallis turns his attention to Australia, and scores 147 at the Gabba - his best Test score in Australia - but the hosts make plenty too in a high-scoring draw.

Nov 21, 2013 Return to ODIs

After missing 29 successive ODIs that South Africa played - dating back to February 2012 - Kallis is back in the fold for the home series against Pakistan and India. He has limited success with the bat, though, scoring 76 runs in four innings.

December 25, 2013 Farewell to Tests

A Test career that has lasted 18 years comes to an end as Kallis announces that the Boxing Day Test against India in Durban will be his last. In seven Tests in 2013, he has scored only 194 runs at 17.63 - his worst year in Tests. However, he also announces his availability for ODIs, and his aim to play the 2015 World Cup.

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